I Love Captain's Wafers and I Don't Care What You Say...So Do You!

Alright, if I've said it once, I've said it a gazbillion times: sanitation is a NECESSITY, people!! Grief!

Tonight, I was seated at the illustrious King's Restaurant in my hometown of Four Oaks and enjoying myself a great deal. My mom, dad, sister, and her husband (who shall remain nameless) were with me and we were talking incessantly and giggling like we always do. The time came to shut up and order and I found myself staring at the dry-erase board up on the wall that displayed the specials. I decided on the chef salad with (gulp) ranch dressing. Therin lay my mistake.
My mom, bless her, ordered the same thing, again with the ranch dressing. After joking her in the necessary manner about being a "copycat", we began the joyous wait for our food in the midst of cigarette smoke and jovial bursts of redneck laughter. Okay fine, they weren't all rednecks laughing. Some of them were Craig.
Anyway, I do have a point.
The food came (very eventually) and two chef salads of admirable size were plunked down unceremoniously in front of my mother and I. No dressing. Speaking around her toothpick, our somewhat brusque waitress barked (in an endearing tone), "what kinna dressin' you wont?"
"Ranch," I replied with a lovely smile. I'm good at those.
I wasn't prepared for the horror which followed.
Plunked (yes, same as the salads) down on the table between my mother and I was a....uh....how do I say this? Well, I named it "community ranch". It was a bottle of ranch dressing, the likes of which a single family would keep in their refrigerator for their own personal use. Not a packet or tiny, single-serving plastic cup to be seen anywhere. I looked up at the waitresses' retreating back incredulously. Surely she couldn't mean that we were to use this, ahem, used bottle of community ranch? There's no telling how many people had used this bottle! The label was slightly translucent and yellowed from the oil of...something i'd rather not think of, and (this is the best part) underneath the cap, there was a yellow-ish, clear-ish ring of congealed salad dressing, speckled with pepper or whatever that blackish stuff is in ranch dressing. I couldn't use this dressing! I just COULDN'T!

Oh, but I did, my friends. Turns out it was either that dressing or no dressing and as my mom was brave enough to use it, well i just couldn't be shown up. So I took a deep breath, used a napkin in each hand, and poured the dressing, sniffing it first to make sure it wasn't absolutely spoiled. It smelled and looked fine. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I hate to say it but I ate that salad (well...mostly the accompanying Captain's Wafers) and I paid for it later. Sanitation.
That's the point of this whole blog post, people. Practice sanitation. I should've asked for my salad to go and just used the "clean", non-community dressing bottle that I had at home in my own personal refrigerator, I suppose. I know I would've enjoyed my salad consumption experience a lot more and I would've had the peace of mind of knowing that the bottle hadn't been handled by 25 other grubby-handed people. I could've insisted that they throw the less-than-appealing bottle out. But I did neither. And I wish I had.
Do you know that on an almost daily basis, I visit the ladies room at my office (but wait, there's more!) and I'll hear another woman (presumably...i mean, i'm not looking or anything) come in, do her "thing", flush, and LEAVE?? That's right, leave. No washing of the hands. None. Not even the effort of turning the water on for a few seconds to make it sound like they're washing their hands. They just leave, wiping their nasty hands on whatever they touch along the way. It's cold and flu season, people!! I don't want your nasty germs!!! I wash my hands, dry them, turn the water off with the paper towels, and then use those same paper towels to open the bathroom door and any subsequent doors on the way back to my office. No germs for me! I hope.

Sigh.

We live in a world full of crud. Let's share love, peace, joy, and more love. But please, for the love of Pete and all that's good and fuzzy, don't share your CRAP! Wash your hands!! Serve people clean salad dressing (or insert any kind of food, beverage, and/or condiment here. Yes, I said condiment. CONDIMENT!!) in your restaurants and don't ever, EVER put anything on their table that might activate their gag reflex. You have a RESPONSIBILITY!!

I'm finished. Pass the Pepto.

Anybody want to go camping? Anybody??

Wow, the weather's been gorgeous the past day or two! I worked from home yesterday (did I mention I LOVE my job?) and when I didn't have my head buried in the screen of my laptop, I got outside whenever I could, playing with Maggie and harassing my sister's cats. She's got a whole herd of 'em. They don't like me, mostly. It's okay though...i don't deter easily.

You know what's even more awesome about this beautiful weather? I get to spend a big ol' chunk of it at Caswell this weekend. That's right, I'm taking the afternoon off on Friday to drive down and spend a whole weekend with Yam and my lovely assistant/friend Holly (Molly). I'm so excited about this, especially because I haven't seen Holly in a coon's age. Or more specifically, since last spring. She's such a sweet and silly person and I love her to pieces. She and I have giggled relentlessly and eaten ice cream and german food and shopped and rung up countless campers in the PX. We've vented about school and boys and work and boys...and boys. And then she found the boy that apparently requires no venting...and decided, "hey, maybe I should keep this one!" Kidding...sort of. But what it comes to is that my good friend Holly is getting married this summer to a young man I can't wait to get to know. The wedding is in May and she asked me to be a bridesmaid! I was so excited when she asked me. I've only been a bridesmaid to my sister so far, so to have someone not obligated by blood relation ask me to be in their wedding was a compliment I was surprised and thrilled to receive! I've so far ordered my lovely lavender gown (floor-length, halter top) and am now in the market for shoes...but I'm sure she and I will discuss girly wedding-y stuff this weekend (Don't worry...I won't include details of hair and nails and self-tanning).

It's a weird thing when your friends start getting married all around you. My friends Aaron and Downey, and Jayson and Sarah are getting married in the coming months (Aaron and Downey on the same day as Holly!) and then I have two cousins, Rebecca and Jennifer, who will have their weddings this summer and fall, respectively. A good friend from work, Monica, is getting married in early June and fingers crossed, I'll be able to make it before flying for the first time to Philly (that's right, i'm gonna fly!). Sigh. I've got a lot of dresses to buy. And singing to do. I'm looking forward to all of it though! I love getting dressed up and watching people I love get married....my face always hurts from smiling after weddings. It's something I look forward to for myself one day but until God sets that plan into action, I take the most joy from the excitement and happiness of those around me. Well...I say that now. Nathan, keep your sarcastic comments to yourself. That goes for all of you. I haven't bought stock in Kleenex yet.

For those of you who haven't gone to see Music and Lyrics yet, go. It's so much fun to watch and you'll find the songs stuck in your head at the end of the night. I'm not ashamed to admit that i bought the soundtrack on itunes. Yes, i've been rocking out the dulcet tones of none other than Hugh Grant. His pants, though tight in this movie, don't come close to the near-obscenity that David Bowie's wardrobe presented in The Labyrinth so if you're apprehensive, rest easy. Though there are many gratuitous cleavage shots, it's overall good, clean fun. Two slap-bracelets up.

Buzzing on Dr. Pepper and Excedrin Migraine

I love to watch professional wrestling. Obviously.

This is just a short blog bulletin to let you all know that I am now officially on the road to grad school preparation. I scheduled a nice four-hour slot to take the ominous GRE next month. So wish me luck (better yet, lift up a few prayers!) and let's keep our fingers crossed that NC State will look at my application, shrug their shoulders, and say "what the hey, let's give her a shot."

Here we go, Wolfpack!

Who's Been Eating my Reese's Pieces?

Love, exciting and new....come aboard! We're expecting you! The Love Boat...

Yay, it's Valentine's Day. Seriously, yay. Yes, I'm single (for the moment, guys!) and will therefore be having the "Girls' Night" celebration of Valentine's Day, post-work this evening. Movies and sushi and gabbing, oh my! But it doesn't follow that I'm bitter or unhappy about that. Neither does it mean that this "holiday of love" disgusts me or that I see it as a bogus holiday created by the greeting card, candy, and flower industries as a way to get us poor love-struck saps to spend more money. I love Valentine's day. I love love! There's a whole herd of people out there that God has brought into my life for me to love and who love me back and I'm just as much inclined to celebrate that as I would be had I a date with Hugh Jackman this evening! I have a family who's got my back no matter what I manage to get myself into. Honestly, they love me in the closest way I can imagine to how God loves me...without any catches or conditions or "pissy mood days". Yes, they love me even with all my pissy moods. I have friends who go out of their way to let me know they're thinking about me or just want to spend an afternoon at the mall with me, catching up and eating full-fat muffins at Caribou Coffee. I have friends who've let me log countless hours on their psychotherapy couches, listening and commiserating and sharing cookies. I have friends who leave me myspace and facebook notes of encouragement and silliness that I just can't get enough of. Emails of pointless hilarity and grounded advice that make my day. I love you all so much!
And let me not forget the Friend and Father whose love has proven even more strong and steadfast than the rest. I haven't always looked for it, but it's always been there regardless, more steady and complete than any form of love I've experienced from a human standpoint. Jesus loves me, this I know. And I know it because He's shown me. With ever-stronger patience, He's shown me.
I have found myself, over the last couple of months, engrossed in conversations with several different girlfriends about relationships and "guys" in general. In a couple of the instances we've discussed, my friend was confused and claimed that the guy was sending "mixed signals" or "just seemed too busy for a relationship right now". Well, if there's one thing I've learned, and I'm not bashful about sharing this, it's that when a guy is interested, he'll leave no doubt in your mind that he's interested. It's just that simple. If he doesn't, he's not worth the worry. How will he indicate his interest? He'll SHOW it. Talk only gets you so far. I've learned a lot of things in the last four months and one thing God has shown me is that when somebody loves you, they'll show you. God shows me His love every day. He sends me signs and blessings and scriptures and sometimes just a feeling. He connects with me in some way every single day. I know He loves me. This knowledge has enabled me to look at relationships and life in general with new eyes in a way that i'd somehow overlooked before. It's enabled me to see that His love is the only love that will fulfill me in every single way that my heart needs and wants. As long as I know this, all other love from anyone else in this life is icing on an already beautiful cake! What a pressure that's removed from me and what a pressure that can remove from all of us who are single and searching or even those of us who are in relationships. The pressure to "find someone fast" is gone! The pressure to shape those we love into forms that better fulfill us and the kind of love we think we need is gone! The pressure our loved ones come under to "fill our holes" is gone! The holes are already filled! We already have all the love we'll ever need in this life and the next. What we've got to do is to wrap our heads around the knowledge that God loves us. Really loves us. Passionately loves us. The kind of love our hearts long for is already being offered...all we've got to do is accept and enjoy it.

The thing is, Valentine's Day is just a day, people. Love is love and I hope that if I do nothing else in this life, that I show people the love of God through my love of them EVERY DAY...just like my family and friends have done for me. That's what this life is all about. All we need is love...His.

Happy Valentine's Day, everybody!